I don't like bitching but ...

I don’t like bitching, but (so sure, here’s the but) if Bruce Cohen in his blog, A nightmare called Nedbank, thinks his banking issues were hell — and they were — try China. We’re in the Stone Age here. Might as well stick your precious shells under a rock in your cave.

Huh? Readers might ask, and say, “But in a previous article (Global meltdown: China’s a cool place to stay), with slanted eyes — forgive the pun — you were virtually advising us to move to the land of chopsticks and rice?”

That blog was simple and stuck to one point. It is a cool place for Westerners like us who teach English and the demand for our skills is huge, and the demand is not likely to drop much in the foreseeable future. But the banking system here makes Nedbank look like a well-oiled machine.

When we first came to China nearly four years ago we needed a Chinese translator for just about everything. Our translator was Felix, a young Chinese English teacher. Felix asked us: “Where do you want to open an account?”

“Bank of China,” I said. Hell, we didn’t know which one to go to. The name sounded patriotic and sturdy enough.

First surprise: you cannot have a joint bank account. My wife could not be issued with a separate card to have joint access. That is just unthinkable in mainland China, and Felix did not even understand the request. We decided to open an account in my name and could only get one card.

Next surprise, the big one: If your school or any other company is with one bank, say the Bank of Construction, then that bank will only deposit money into Construction Bank accounts, not other banks. So every month we had to go and collect our salaries cash, physically count the notes and make a beeline for the closest, sturdy Bank of China.

Of course, I asked Felix, “Why didn’t you tell us to open an account with the Bank of Construction in the first place?” He hung his head, sullenly refused to answer and we received one of our first introductions to the ways Chinese can think. He then refused to help us open an account at the Bank of Construction for reasons I have never been able to understand.

We now freelance for various companies. Needless to say we have five different cards for five different companies to bank our various incomes. So you can’t really choose which bank to go with. You just have to go with the bank your company chooses. Depriving the customer of making choices for a quality bank ensures the service in China can be shocking.

For example, I have to bank with Bank of China (BOC) because Learning, one of the companies I work for, banks with BOC. This month I have to open a bank account with a bank called ICBC because Learning has decided to change banks. So I, willy-nilly, have to change to ICBC too.

The Bank of China card was once swallowed by an ATM. I went to the branch where we opened it and they said it would take a week to get the card back.

No, you, valued customer, cannot cancel the old one and get a new card. We don’t think to get paid or paid to think or whatever.

I was told that until next week there was no way I could draw money even though I had my passport and knew my pin number and they had a record of the selfsame passport.

I exploded.

They — bewildered by my response for some reason — asked me for my yellow book. Say what?

I vaguely recalled being given a little yellow book, but assumed that was some kind of freebee like a chequebook wallet thingy and little calculator we used to get at Standard Bank. Nobody told us the yellow book was a substitute and was usable to draw cash. I didn’t know where the hell it was.

If we had been on holiday somewhere with only that card we would have faced considerable heartache with that kind of non-service.

I went back a week later with my passport to get my card. (By the way, queues to get service can sometimes be half an hour and more. Take a book or your lunch.) I got back the card and tried drawing money. No way. Fresh queue to speak to the bank clerk. They still would not give me cash. “Your card has been blocked,” the clerk brightly informed me.

“FFS, I did not block the card!” I thundered.

The previous explosion was a grannies’ tea party compared with this one. Security guards came over. The manager came in, relented, made a few calls and I was able to use the card again. He shooed the security guards away who were about ready to hustle me out the bank.

A few days later I got a phone call from the sturdy Bank of China. “No more use bank card. It having problems.”

“But it’s my money,” I replied.

“That okay. You can come take out all your money. All of it. Then cut card. No problem.”

I didn’t want to because Learning deposits money into that account. I had a bright idea. I went to a branch of the Bank of China near my home. (I did not feel it was a good idea to go to the previous branch where I now had a reputation for being a foul-mouthed lunatic.)

I opened a new account. I then slowly held up my old card and asked if the money from the old account could be transferred into it.

I waited for the answer with bated breath. Take nothing for granted in China, I had learned long ago. She looked at me like I was a reincarnation of Albert Einstein and slowly nodded her head. The transfer was done immediately

Bingo! I had cracked the system.

Bank cards here crack easily; the plastic is not the same quality as SA bank cards. My cards never cracked in SA. Here they do. So each time, instead of waiting for a week to get the next card, I literally open a new account (with a new account number, which I email to the company I work for that uses that bank.)

Yep, I had found a way around the system. But they must have had a conference about how to out-trick cunning foreigners who beat their time-honoured system of bumpkin inefficiency and wholesale abuse of customers.

Just the other day my Bank of Construction card cracked. I went in to ask if I could get a new card. (They don’t issue yellow booklet thingummies.)

For you, sir, our valued customer, a new card will take two weeks. Two weeks, where you, honoured, VIP customer, have no access to cash unless you have other cards.

I wanted to do my old trick and open a new account and transfer from the old one. But Marion’s salary was about to go into the account. I did not want it lost in cyberspace and go through the heartache — especially when dealing with the Chinese — of fighting for our money.

I sighed and agreed to wait two weeks for the new card. I saw the cunning smile on the bank clerk’s face.

Oh yeah, they must have had that conference on how to second-guess wily foreigners who thought they had figured out their system.